Who‘s coming to FiLIA?

[lanadelgrey]

I‘m starting to get excited.
Are there plans for a MN meetup?

Anyone?

Me!
We had a MN meetup at. Cardiff and at Glasgow.

Me! With a car-full of Terven!

I’m going! Id love to go to a MN meet-up as I’m going alone!

Jeez, why are they holding it in Brighton of all places?!

Me! And I would love to meet up

No. I’ve been in correspondence with them about a session on trans widows and children of transitioners for several years, and was turned down for a different reason each time. This year they’ve arranged one without me, and the first thing I knew was when it was announced.

@ArealAdultHumanFemale do MN organise this?

No, we do it via the app that's used as the programme.

That’s poor of them.

The environment may be hostile outside! There are some TWAW loons in Brighton..

Sounds good though, I’d love to go

When I first went to Filia, there were 2 blokes hanging round the reception desk, the toilets were renamed 'gender neutral' and when I asked where the female toilets were, was told there was one upstairs.

Never trusted them since. Seems a wise decision. No idea why people get so excied about them.

Interesting. Wonder what the toilets will say this year, particularly given the location

You’re not the only ones they’re excluding. FiLiA is now an utter joke.

Is it? Why is that? I just don’t know so am interested. Are they like the party of women sort of feminists?? As in not feminists at all.

Don’t know why. But apparently Sheila Jeffreys can’t do a talk about her book and nor can Fiona Mcanena (spelling??). For some reason. Not sure what.

I’ve always seen them as a bit head girly/WPUK, but I know women I know go and get a lot out of it, so I don’t want to harsh their buzz. It’s an important event. I don’t agree with the way they treat some women though.

Agree with this sentiment wholeheartedly.
I always go to FiLiA with a small group friends, we use it as part of our social calendar, as we no longer live close to each other, so we rent a holiday cottage, enjoy the day, meet up in the evening, discuss what we’ve seen, love the women only club night.
We booked tickets for this year way in advance, prior to the location being announced. Since confirming it is to be held in Brighton one friend has definitely decided not to go and the rest of us are considering our position.

I don’t believe that any area should be off limits to women, but we have all experienced the fear of TRAs protesting against women meeting (not just at FiLiA but including - credible bomb threats, attacking buildings, having to be escorted in/out by police, being spat on, witnessing physical assault and in the case of the WP meeting in Brighton which two of us attended as we were in Brighton as LP delegates - the fact that Sussex Police did absolutely nothing to assist our safety) and, even without the recent Supreme Court ruling, we think this was an ill advised choice of venue.

I have often felt that there was some kind of power struggle within the organisation and having read some of the earlier responses, particularly TinselAngel, I now feel more unease at attending.

Yes being in the same category as Sheila Jeffreys is pretty cool, but I’d rather they credited me for my work given I pretty much built trans widows single handedly from nothing.

Just for clarity, none of the women who are on the panel are to blame for my exclusion.

Sheila Jeffreys is a brilliant speaker, I’ve been lucky enough to hear her about 4 times.

I’m not going this year but to be fair, I think it’s a long time since they’ve had that attitude.

She rules. Being quoted in her last book is one of my proudest achievements!

I’m going to her book launch in Brighton on Friday 10 October. They’ve got Jo Bartosch too.

I'll be there. The feeling of being in an auditorium with about 1000 other women is something that all women & girls should experience. Reminds me of the Women's Lib conferences I went to in the late 1970s as a teenage feminist. And I like the way that FiLIA reminds me that there is a feminist activism beyond turning back the TRA madness (as important as that is!). There are so many other vital fights & activists to keep in our sights - or at least to try to learn about. FiLIA is particularly good on the nternational and global South aspect of the broad femnist movement. As is Women's Declaration International, a smaller but equally interesting & excellent grass roots group. And the Women's Rights Network, which is doing sterling work with Afghani women.

And some things don't change - the internal disagreements & hurt feelings, and hierarchies and attacks in those hierarchies. In my teen years it was mostly about straight v lesbians ("How can you sleep with the enemy?") and also between the socialists and the liberals - between revolution, and what was the long slow work of changing laws via the civil service & law reform (by what we called "femocrats"). There was fairly regular sniping between various groups.

Which is/was a pity because in the end, we're all aiming for roughly (not exactly) the same things.

I really don't think we should be too wound up about the "head girls" narrative. Feminism is a widespread and grass roots movement, and there are bound to be disagreements - on aims, and means of reaching those aims.

We all do our bit - small, large, private, public, all efforts are important. No-one owns any feminist activism, or feminist narrative.

Kath Stock said years ago that she thought women needed to learn to disagree with each other (and be disagreed with) and to find it less traumatic or difficult. I have thought a lot about this since I heard her say it, and tried to learn more about how to disagree and be disagreed with, and not to feel I'm an awful person. Feminine socialisation runs deep, and consciousness raising is a lifetime's work. [Anyone here a veteran of a 70s CR group? IYKYK]